Longtime Dogs’ play-by-play voice lands with Flames

DEREK WILLS

Courtesy JEFF BOUGH, Hamilton Bulldogs

Derek Wills calls a goal during a Buffalo Sabres-Vancouver Canucks game in 2010. After a long career with the AHL Hamilton Bulldogs, Wills will now by the radio play-by-play voice of the NHL's Calgary Flames.

When the DVD arrived at his house with video of a Calgary Flames game from a few years back, he knew this was his chance. If he could provide NHL quality play-by-play to accompany the images, he might have a chance to finally get the job he'd been after for most of his life.

Only thing was, he had to make this magic in his living room. No crowd. No atmosphere. No music. No colour commentator.

"It was different," Derek Wills says. "But I got right into it."

The longtime voice of the Hamilton Bulldogs put on a suit and tie just as he'd done for 1,147 consecutive games with the American Hockey League team. He cobbled together 18 pages of notes. Then he fired up the TV and got at it.

It clearly went OK. On Thursday afternoon, the 37-year-old was introduced as the new radio voice of the Flames.

"It's exciting," he says. "I'm having a tough time wrapping my head around it."

Quite honestly, even Wills wondered if this would ever happen.

Over the years he'd applied for a number of big-league radio jobs. He'd called a game for the Buffalo Sabres. None of them turned into a spot in an NHL booth. But when the Montreal Canadiens' English radio job came open in the spring of 2011, he thought this was his moment.

The Dogs are the Habs' farm team. He'd called many games on the same station that was now hiring. He was so confident that he started taking French lessons.

He wasn't noticing his blind spot.

By his own admission his calls that year were getting more and more over the top. Those are his words. Unfortunately, the folks from the station were listening and obviously felt the same way.

"I was, quite frankly, devastated and embarrassed when I didn't get that job," he says.

The sting was so painful he thought about quitting. But then he did something crazy. Rather than giving up, he asked the boss who bypassed him to offer feedback on what he'd done wrong.

"He told me to turn down the volume 20 per cent and slow down," Wills says. "It was hard to hear but it was good advice."

He even tempered his goal call which he says had been his signature.

Shortly after the Bulldogs' season ended in the spring, he caught wind that longtime Flames play caller Peter Maher was retiring. He sent in some digital files of games he'd called since making the changes. An hour later he got a call back asking for an interview. Before long, he was sitting in a boardroom in Calgary facing six executives from Sportsnet and the Flames.

"It was pretty intimidating," he says.

Especially when they asked about his favourite team growing up. This close to reaching his dream, he wasn't sure if he should be honest and admit he'd been an Edmonton Oilers' fan. It could be like touting the virtues of a rare steak to an army of vegans at a PETA convention.

But he did. And several days later as he was sitting at a restaurant, the radio station's program director slid an envelope across the table containing an offer. A couple decades after starting as a host of Jr. B games on Welland cable TV and 13 years after landing his job with the Bulldogs, he'd become an NHL play by play man.

"It was a little surreal," he says. "It had been so long. There had been so many times over the years I thought I wouldn't get there."

On Friday, he leaves for Calgary. His first day is Tuesday, his birthday.

Question is, has he bought a big, white 10-gallon Stampede-friendly cowboy hat yet? Something that tells everyone he's adopted the spirit of his new city.

"No," he says. "Not yet."

But wouldn't that make a statement in the press box?

"That would be a statement all right," he laughs. "Not sure it's the statement I want to make."

The Hamilton Bulldogs say they expect to have a replacement for radio play-by-play commentator Derek Wills in place sometime next week.

As soon as it was announced that he was leaving after 13 years behind the microphone in Hamilton, close to 40 applications began pouring in.

"The quality of the candidates we got has been unbelievable," says team president Stephen Ostaszewicz.

He says resumés have arrived from coast to coast and into the United States from people doing Tier II junior games, Canadian Hockey League junior games and even current American Hockey League broadcasters. One even came from someone who'd called WHA games back in the day.

Jeff Storey, program director at 900CHML which carries the games, says at least 10 were serious candidates. That list has been whittled down to five.

The person ultimately chosen will be a full-time employee of the Bulldogs.

The Bulldogs open their regular season Oct. 11 against the Rochester Americans.